Patrick Mattimore, The Examiner
2007-04-09 10:00:00.0
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SAN FRANCISCO -

It’s the time of year when the nation’s elite colleges boast about how many more students they were able to reject this year than last year. One high school psychology class has come up with a way to goose the gander — class rejection therapy.

Students bring their rejection letters to class. The most rejected student gets a prize, but the real competition is for the “worst letter” colleges. Harvard is running head and shoulders above the rest in the “most obsequious while maintaining utter insincerity” category. Harvard lets students know how “very sorry” they are to reject them. They then bestow three wishes, none of which they grant. First, Harvard wishes that they were writing with a different decision. Second, they wish that it was possible to admit the rejectee. Finally, they hope the student they deny will accept their best wishes.

Colleges also compete in the “least number of words you need to read before you know you are being rejected category.” Often the contestants need two words as in “We regret ... .” This year, however, the winner was Northwestern which began their letter with the word “After ... .” That, of course, is the prelude to telling the student how carefully they considered her credentials before rejecting her. It’s always a good bet that a college never starts off telling you how carefully they considered your credentials before accepting you.

Lots of schools are vying for the “most emphatic rejection” prize. Cornell is leading the race, informing students in consecutive sentences that the electronic rejection they are reading will be confirmed in a follow-up letter that will make the rejection official. We don’t want you. Get it? We really don’t want you. The “snuff out all hopes” double rejection strategy appears to be colleges’ latest attempt to improve their U.S. News & World Report selectivity rating. Two rejections for the price of one. What tipped the scale in Cornell’s favor is that they even include an invitation for you to visit their Web site to get information about applying to transfer to Cornell after your freshman year, so they can reject you again.

Cal Poly is the hands-down “shortest rejection” winner, having trimmed their denials down to one sentence. Many colleges are in a dead heat vying for “least original rejection” by sending word-for-word copies that are distinguished only by the overall rejection numbers they plug into the letter.

The grand prize for “total insensitivity” is presented to Reed College. One student applied to Reed and when the college failed to notify him that they had received his materials, the student sent a polite follow-up letter inquiring about his status. Reed sent him back what was apparently intended to be an interoffice memo which read “he’s a deny.” Reed’s selection as biggest overall loser precludes them from “shortest rejection” contention.

Students have crafted psychological tips colleges might adopt instead of telling applicants about the other “talented and highly qualified” students they rejected or the fact that the admissions office is comforted in knowing that “you will have many other fine choices” of colleges. Assuaging the colleges’ guilt is not what the process is about.

The best student sensitivity suggestion this year advised admissions’ offices to adopt the relationship break-up line, “it’s not you, it’s us.” The recipient of “He’s a deny” sent a raft of improvement suggestions to Reed and concluded his five pages of suggestions by letting the school know that they should feel “free to send apology or ‘he’s an admit’” letter. He got the apology only.

Patrick Mattimore teaches psychology at a college preparatory school in San Francisco. He wants to thank students Tom Kilgore, Lily Hodges, Lorenzo Cabrera and Daniel Schoknecht, all of whom consensually provided some fodder for this article.